The $100k Ice Cream Sacking: What SME Employers Should Take From It

A truck driver forgets to set a trailer to the right temperature. By the time the truck reaches its destination, $73,000 of ice cream has melted, plus another $30,000 to get rid of it. He’s sacked. He argues he shouldn’t have lost his job because he wasn’t the only one who dropped the ball. The Fair Work Commission didn’t buy it, and upheld the dismissal.

It’s a story with an obvious headline. But underneath the ice cream is a genuinely useful principle for any SME employer managing a mistake that cost real money: you don’t need to prove your employee was the only cause of the problem to have a valid reason to dismiss them.

What happened?

The driver was tasked with collecting a refrigerated load and driving it several hours to its destination. The trailer needed to sit at around minus 22 degrees. Instead, it was set to roughly minus 1. Over the course of the trip, the load defrosted completely. By the time anyone caught the problem, the ice cream was a write-off.

The driver told the Commission he genuinely believed he’d set the temperature correctly and had no explanation for why it hadn’t held. He also accepted he’d had several chances to check the trailer temperature during the drive and hadn’t done so.

Why didn’t ‘I wasn’t the only one at fault’ work as a defence?

The driver argued the cold storage facility shouldn’t have loaded the truck when the temperature was already wrong, and that a second driver further down the supply chain had also failed to catch the problem, and had also been sacked. His argument was essentially: plenty of people missed this, so why is it just me who loses my job?

The Commissioner rejected that. Whatever anyone else may or may not have done, the driver had his own clear responsibility to set the temperature correctly and check it during the trip, and he didn’t meet either obligation. Other people’s failures don’t cancel out your own.

This is the bit worth bolting to your wall. In a lot of workplace incidents, more than one person or system contributes to the outcome. Employees will often point at everyone else involved to argue they shouldn’t be singled out. That’s a natural instinct, but it’s not how the Commission tests fairness. The question is simply: did this person fail to do what was reasonably required of them? If yes, it doesn’t matter that others also failed.

Does a single mistake count less because it’s a ‘one-off’?

The Commission accepted this was effectively a one-off failure across a long stretch of otherwise ordinary trips. That still didn’t save the driver’s job. The reasoning was that the size of the consequence was foreseeable given the nature of the task: if you’re moving a temperature-sensitive load and you get the setting wrong, and then don’t check it across several opportunities, a costly write-off is exactly the kind of outcome that’s likely to follow.

This matters because a lot of employers assume a clean record automatically softens a serious incident. It can, and it’s still a relevant factor in the overall fairness assessment. But it won’t rescue a decision where the risk was obvious and the employee had real opportunities to catch it and didn’t.

What should SME employers take from this?

• A valid reason doesn’t require sole responsibility. If your employee failed to do what their role required, that stands on its own, even if other people or other businesses also dropped the ball.
• A clean record helps, but it isn’t a shield. Where the risk was foreseeable and the employee had clear chances to prevent it, a good history won’t automatically turn a serious incident into an unfair dismissal.
• Document the opportunities the employee had to catch the error. In this case, the number of chances the driver had to check the temperature during the trip was central to the finding against him. If you’re relying on a similar argument, be specific about what checks were available and when.
• Keep prior warnings on file even if they’re unrelated to the current incident. They won’t make or break your case alone, but they help build the full picture of the employment relationship.

One founder we worked with ran a similar situation in the food logistics space: a single error, a big financial hit, and a team member insisting they weren’t solely to blame. We helped them build a case around the specific responsibilities the employee held and the opportunities they’d had to prevent the loss, rather than getting drawn into an argument about who else was at fault. The dismissal stood up without a claim being lodged.

If your business runs on tight tolerances, whether that’s temperature, timing, compliance or safety, it’s worth having a clear view of what a fair, well-documented process looks like before something goes wrong. It’s a much easier conversation to have in advance than after $100,000 has gone in the bin.

FAQs: valid reason and shared responsibility

Can an employer dismiss an employee even if other people also contributed to the mistake?

Yes. The Fair Work Commission has confirmed that an employee’s own failure to meet their responsibilities can be a valid reason for dismissal, regardless of whether other people or other businesses also failed to prevent the same incident.

Does a good employment record protect an employee from dismissal after one serious mistake?

Not automatically. A clean record is a relevant factor the Commission will weigh up, but it won’t outweigh a serious, foreseeable outcome where the employee had clear opportunities to prevent it and didn’t take them.

What makes a workplace mistake a ‘valid reason’ rather than just bad luck?

A valid reason needs to be sound, defensible and directly connected to the employee’s conduct or capacity. A costly and foreseeable consequence of failing to follow a clear procedure, especially where there were multiple chances to catch the error, will usually meet that test.

Should I still dismiss someone if a supplier or another business also contributed to a costly error?

You can still have a valid reason to dismiss your own employee for their part in the failure. It’s worth documenting exactly what was within their control and what wasn’t, so the decision is defensible on its own facts rather than resting on comparisons with other parties.

Case reference: Manly v ERH Refrigerated Transport Pty Ltd, Fair Work Commission, Commissioner Sloan. Jelly: please confirm the exact FWC citation number and add the direct link before publishing.